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DRAFT REPORT (2023/2118(INI))

On human rights and democracy in the world and the European Union’s policy on the matter – annual report 2023

AFET-PR-751673

Committee on Foreign Affairs · Rapporteur: Nacho Sánchez Amor

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This is a draft report by the Committee on Foreign Affairs on human rights and democracy in the world and the EU's policy on the matter – annual report 2023. It reviews global human rights challenges and sets out what Parliament asks the EU and its member states to do. It condemns violations such as executions, torture, arbitrary arrests, censorship and attacks on civil society, and calls on the EU to counter authoritarianism and uphold international humanitarian law. It addresses rights including the death penalty, freedom of expression, religion, equality, women, migrants, LGBTIQ+ people, children, persons with disabilities, elderly people, food and a clean environment. It asks for stronger EU tools: the action plan, the Global Europe instrument, human rights clauses in agreements, human rights dialogues, the Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime, democracy support, protection of human rights defenders, and action against impunity and corruption. It calls for the EU to speak with one voice at the UN, to support the International Criminal Court, and for member states' embassies and EU delegations to do more to promote human rights.

Committee position. The rapporteur proposes that Parliament adopt a resolution reaffirming the universality of human rights, condemning violations worldwide, and calling for stronger EU tools including the action plan, sanctions regime, human rights clauses and protection of human rights defenders.

Key points

  1. Reasserts the universality and indivisibility of human rights and the EU's duty to promote and protect democracy and human rights worldwide.
  2. Stresses the EU must counter the rise of authoritarianism, illiberalism and populism and attacks on human rights and international humanitarian law.
  3. Condemns violations including executions, torture, arbitrary arrests, clampdowns on civil society, censorship and threats to independent media.
  4. Calls for rapid and unimpeded passage of humanitarian aid and humanitarian corridors in armed conflicts, and condemns their humanitarian and human rights consequences.
  5. Calls for all countries to abolish the death penalty or establish an immediate moratorium, and deplores the highest level of executions in five years in some non-EU countries.
  6. Condemns censorship through 'foreign agents' laws and strategic lawsuits against public participation, and violations of freedom of religion or belief.
  7. Condemns all forms of racism, intolerance, xenophobia and discrimination, and calls for an EU charter of women's rights and action on sexual and reproductive health and rights.
  8. Denounces the erosion of the rights and safety of migrants, refugees and forcibly displaced persons, and calls for their rights to be upheld in EU migration policy.
  9. Calls for a swift and ambitious agreement on corporate sustainability due diligence with binding rules, and for a forced labour product ban.
  10. Calls for full implementation of the LGBTIQ Equality Strategy 2020-2025 and for a systematic approach to children's rights across EU external policies.
  11. Calls for the EU to promote mandatory UN guidelines on the right to food and to protect environmental human rights defenders and indigenous activists.
  12. Calls for human rights clauses to apply to all EU international agreements, for qualified majority voting on the Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime, and for an EU-wide multi-entry visa scheme for human rights defenders at risk.

Who is affected

  • EU institutions and member states, which are asked to promote and protect human rights and democracy worldwide.
  • Human rights defenders, journalists and civil society organisations, whom the report supports and seeks to protect.
  • Migrants, refugees and forcibly displaced persons, whose rights the report says must be upheld.
  • LGBTIQ+ people, children, persons with disabilities, elderly people, women and girls, whose rights the report addresses.
  • Non-EU countries and partner countries, which are urged to abolish the death penalty and respect human rights clauses.

Figures and deadlines

  • 70 % of the world's population now living under authoritarian rule according to the University of Gothenburg.
  • 122 million forcibly displaced people by the end of 2022, which has doubled in the past 10 years.
  • Until 2014 the EU formally activated human rights clauses on two dozen occasions; since then only one occasion of 'appropriate measures'.

Legal basis: Articles 2, 3, 8, 21 and 23 of the Treaty on European Union (TEU) and Articles 17 and 207 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU).